Sour Mushroom Beet Soup

Sour Mushroom Beet Soup
1# Shiitake Mushrooms
1# Crimini Mushrooms
1# Portobella Mushrooms
2 sticks of butter
2 onions
4 cans Frank's Sauerkraut Juice
2 bottles of Gold's Russian Borscht
Water

Chop onions and mushrooms into reasonably sized bits.
Heat skillet
Place butter in skillet and allow to melt
Turn heat down to medium - add mushrooms and onions, cover Cook for 10 minute intervals. See how things go. Stir occasionally.

Once the mushrooms and onions are cooked to your satisfaction, dump them into a largish pot. Pour in the Borscht and the Sauerkraut juice. This is perhaps the tricky part. Add at least 1 can of water for each can of juice. I think I ended up with 1.5 cans per can this time, but it seems to vary from time to time.

Cover the pot and let it spend some time together (30 minutes or so)

Add salt if you think that you need to.

Ham Cabbage Potato Soup

Ham - Cabbage - Potato Soup
I bought a fully cooked ham at Aldi's since they were on sale. This was all pretty free form.

Take hunk o' ham. Cut away the skin/fat and toss into the crock pot. Slice away the flesh from the bone so that most is not on the bone, but there is some. Toss bone into crockpot as well. Add hunks of celery, onion and carrots to the crockpot. Add water to cover. Allow to cook over night on high. Take out big bits. Filter the rest through a colander. If there is any ham that seems worth keeping do so, otherwise toss it. Put liquid into fridge. Allow it to sit for awhile. Skim off the fat that has solidified on top (as much as you would like).

The flesh that you so loving sliced away should be diced into whatever sized bits you would like (I did this after I cut it all away and then put it in a container in the fridge)

Dice the following into bits

Carrots

Potatoes (I peeled mine before dicing)

Onions

Cabbage

Put into a large pot with the ham and stock. Add water until it seems right (I think I added too much *sigh*)

Cook until everything is soft.

Enjoy!!!

(I think I should have added a little bit of garlic. I have combined a quart with Daria's Czech Garlic and it seems as though it will be tasty.... )